My first solo trip to Roorkee
This article is all about my visit to a Social Summit held in Roorkee, Haridwar and Rishikesh.
This trip to Roorkee came out to be a big success and I really enjoyed it. So it was a four days long trip and in between, I went to Haridwar and Rishikesh with one of my friends, Sankalp, who happens to be from IIT Roorkee.
Day 1
I started the journey at 10:30 am via Volvo( Bus ), It was a tiring trip but we had a lot of fun. I reached IIT Roorkee by 4 pm (approx) and headed towards the Mcaudi which was near Rajendra Bhawan (Hostel). After the registration, we headed towards the New Hostel (Vigyan Bhawan). It was a good hostel and we were given rooms for two. After some snacks, we went to explore the Campus. As we reached on Friday we used the weekend to explore the IIT Roorkee campus. We slept at around 1 in the morning, and my friend Sankalp told me that students had a different schedule for weekends, they slept after having breakfast on weekends and are awake the rest of the day till the next morning.
Day 2
The following day, I left for Haridwar at 2 pm.
I went there after a really long time (Approx 16 years) and still remembered some of the places, almost felt nostalgic. As we reached there, we headed to Harkipodi and it was time for Aarti by the time we reached. It was an elating experience to attend the Ganga Aarti and if you have never seen it before, I would definitely recommend you to witness it in its full glory. A bone-chilling Ganga snan followed. According to Hindu mythology, Ganga snan is said to wash away all your sins. I took 10 dives (Dives) in the holy river and felt a sense of connection with my soul (maybe a bit exaggerated). After that, we had some food and then we went to a Ghath. If you are into astrology then you can talk to the pandits who claim to give you insights about your past and all that kind of stuff. By 7:30 pm we returned back to campus.
Back at campus, we attended a thrilling Cultural Night event. I delivered my first ever Standup there. That was a whole new experience in itself.
Day 3
In the third day, we had some more events in which we participated and in the evening it was a speaking session by different speakers, the most for which I was waiting was that by Deepak Ramola and as expected he was amazing and we all were inspired a lot by his talk, I met him after his talk and he was so humble, I told him that I came to Roorkee all way from Delhi so he was glad and he took a pic of us together in his phone.
Since it was 6 pm and I was less-on time as I had my train back to Delhi at 7:30 am the next day and I wanted to visit Rishikesh. So we left for Rishikesh at 6:30 pm in the evening and reached Laxman Jhoola at 8:10 pm, I know it sounds crazy to travel in Rishikesh at Night, But seriously it was the best thing happened to me and I will never forget this.
While traveling to Rishikesh we confirmed that there were buses and public transport at night as well, which is not true (that we came to know at the end of the journey). So after reaching Rishikesh, we felt hungry and we were lucky to have some cafes and restaurants to have our meal. Then we started off to the streets but 90% of the places and markets were closed by that time. While going down the street towards the Laxman Jhula we came across the Beatles Cafe one of the best cafes I have been to so far.
We came to know some of the historical facts related to the Beatles Band and then we had a look at some of their musical records and instruments. After this, we started off to the Laxman Jhula and trust me you will never find it more amazing than at night.
After exploring the Laxman Jhula, we went down and found a group of IIT Roorkee Ph.D. students hanging out by the sides of Ganga and having a music jam session.
It was a night well spent and would love to go on this journey again with a planned journey and resources.
Now comes the scary part due to which we avoid these travels at night, So while going down from the Laxman Jhula towards the other side of Rishikesh it was a very dark and silent street at about 2 am and we both were scared as it was a dense forest on both the sides of the street and a few Ashramas. We both decided to run to the end of the street which was about 800 m long and after reaching the end of the street we found a few street lights and a temple, that made us feel a little better. Now as we reached towards the end of the journey and it was the Ram Jhula. We rested for a while there beside river Ganga and planned to end the journey and go back safe.
But the new challenge was to find a public transport that can take us back to the Rishikesh bus stand and we waited for around 40 mins but there was no sign of any vehicle, So we sat beside the Ram Jhula to wait some more and met Rohit a guy from the Sivananda Ashram, he came to know about our situation and told us that at this point of time there will be no public transport available in the whole area. So he suggested us to join him along in his car as he was going to Haridwar and will drop us there at the Haridwar bus stand, It was too risky for both of us to go along with the strangers and that too at 3:30 am in the night(almost morning).
But we had no other option but to take the risk and we went along with him and waited for about 20min at his Ashram as he was loading some goods in his car and he had two more members of the ashram along the journey. Now we were more scared as they were three and we were two. Anything was possible and there we had a small trust and hope that made us take such a risk and hence we reached the Haridwar bus stand at 4:30 am in the morning and reached IIT Roorkee at 5:10 am. We went straight to the respected hostels and took some knap as my train was at 7:30 am the next day.
Some tips:
1 Always have a road map and timings of public transport wherever you travel.
2 Night travel is always risky but it gives a very unique and amazing experience.
The most common slangs at IIT Roorkee are
1 ‘CHAPO’ — It means Party
2 Chill hai bro / Cool hai bro — Usually used by students while they talk to each other and use this when they need to say ok it will be done or sure .
